Shinobi no Yami
by Story-lover1414
Summary: Darkness, a shroud that hides nightmares, a veil that obscures the demons that the world holds. Now watch as one wields the very embodiment of terror itself
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto, Darkness or any crossover elements that may be added into this story.**

**Italics for thoughts**

**Bold for Jutsu, Sealed and Non Human characters**

**XChapter StartX**

Growing up, Naruto had mistakenly believed that the life of a ninja was eating ramen three times a day, saving princesses, and defeating hordes enemy ninja.

He had become a ninja two months earlier, and he had to say that his perceptions had been shattered. He still tried to eat ramen three times a day, but the other two parts had quickly been proven to be false.

For his first month as a ninja, he had been forced to deal with D-rank missions, which were the bane of his existence. He had done four of them with his team and hated how boring they were. They were just chores, really. What made it worse was that he had actually done six of them by himself. Sasuke had the wealth of the Uchiha clan and Sakura had parents that provided for her.

All Naruto had was a stipend that he received from the Hokage. It had paid for his rent and all of his bills, along with the supplies he needed for the Academy. Unfortunately, the stipend had stopped when he graduated, so he needed to do missions to make sure that he did not end up without a place to stay or food to eat.

And then he had seen a great opportunity in the form of a C-rank mission.

In all honesty, it was not worth doing from a monetary standpoint. He had made just as much ryo during D-rank missions with his team as he did on that C-rank mission. And to make matters worse, the C-rank mission had been as difficult as an A-rank mission but without an increase in pay.

But it was when Naruto felt a surge of raw power and things went hazy that occupied his thoughts, just when Naruto felt that power a dark voice accompanied it that said "**SoOn**" normally a voice spoken like that would make Naruto want to avoid whatever it belong to but for some reason he couldn't explain he actually wanted to, and that was something that scared and confused him even more.

When Team 7 had left Nami no Kuni Naruto had noticed that two things had changed with him, he no longer had trouble seeing in the dark, in fact from Naruto's perspective there was no difference between Night and day anymore and the second was that every time Naruto either closed his eyes for long periods of time or he went into a shaded area Naruto saw areas that he didn't recognize one was a village that was similar to Konoha but was made completely out of stone, the next was a village was the same as the stone one but was shrouded in mist, the next was high in the mountains with clouds mingling among the buildings, next was a village that was in a dessert and it's buildings were made completely out of sand with high speed winds lowing, and the last was the only place he recognized, it was Konohagakure.

Getting so much information at once caused Naruto to pass out, luckily for him his team had stopped to rest for the night, when Naruto woke up in the morning he used the trip back as a chance to practice that particular ability so that he could control what and how much he saw at any one moment.

It was with those memories and thoughts that he stood atop Hokage Mountain and looked out at the village. He had gone straight there from the Hokage's office upon their return home and their report.

As Naruto looked out over the village of Konohagakure as he continued to practice with his shadow eyes, a name that Naruto had just thought up, to increase his control over it when suddenly everything became picthblack where the sound of a dark hiss could be heard all around him, something that would scare basically anyone, causing fear to rise up in Naruto but it wasn't from the hissing it was from the fact that Naruto was actually comforted by the sound that scared him and it was then that the voice returned "**YeS sOoN, So vErY SoOn TiL wE mEeT**." Naruto didn't know what it meant and to be honest he didn't care all he wanted was to actually meet whatever the voice belonged to.

Far away in Kumogakure, a dark-skinned man with shaggy white hair was walking down the hallway of the Administration Building in the standard attire of a Kumo shinobi.

The normally lazy look in his eyes had been replaced with a more serious look as he neared the Raikage's office.

Nearing the outside door, he saw Mabui, the Raikage's assistant, sitting at her desk.

"Is the Boss in?" Darui asked with his hands in his pockets.

"Yes Darui, Raikage-sama is in," Mabui answered with a small smile. "He's doing paperwork, so he would appreciate the interruption." The unspoken though I would not lingered at the end of her statement.

Darui could understand her displeasure at the Raikage being interrupted when he was actually doing work for once. It was very difficult to motivate him to actually do paperwork. The fact that Mabui could do so was nothing short of astounding.

Had anyone else witnessed the exchange, they would not have been able to detect the slightest hint of displeasure in the kunoichi, but that was because she was a very pleasant person and was a very skilled ninja. Though she did not look it, she was a jonin.

Walking up to the door, Darui knocked, receiving permission to enter nearly instantly.

As Darui entered the office and shut the door, he saw that the Fourth Raikage, A, was sitting behind his desk with his cloak and hat on.

"Did an issue come up during your mission?" A asked immediately, taking note of the change in Darui's eyes.

"Yeah, the mission ended in failure," Darui said with a frown.

"I see," A said with a hint of displeasure, though he did not seem to upset. "Don't worry about it. It's understandable if you could not find him. His village isn't in any condition to pay his bounty at the moment."

"I did find him," Darui said, making A pause. "He was in a fight with Kakashi Hatake of Konohagakure."

"Oh?" A asked. "Does that mean that the Kirigakure no Kijin (_Demon of the Mist_) was taken care of before you could get to him?"

"Yeah," Darui said as he nodded. "But I got something better than one of the swords of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen."

That had A's full attention.

"After the target died, I decided to do some recon on Hatake's team. He was there with three rookie genin," Darui explained. "One of them wasn't worth paying much attention to. She never sensed me when I was near, even when I wasn't trying to stay hidden. She wasn't from a clan either. But the other two were interesting. The first one's name was Sasuke Uchiha. Apparently he's the kid brother of Itachi Uchiha, and I got a good look at him while he was training. He already unlocked his Sharingan."

"That's a valuable piece of information," A said thoughtfully.

"But it's not as valuable as what I figured out about the third student," Darui interjected. "His name was Naruto Uzumaki."

"A member of the Uzumaki clan?" A asked under his breath, thinking back to the last time his village tried to capture an Uzumaki from the Hidden Leaf Village. "Was he a real Uzumaki with red hair and skill with seals?"

"He didn't have red hair or show any knowledge of seals from what I observed," Darui said as he shook his head. "But that would have just made what I found out even better."

With that, he pulled a picture out from his flak jacket and held it out to A.

"It seems that a failed mission was just what we needed," A said as he looked at the picture of Naruto Uzumaki that had taken of him as he walked through the streets without his knowledge. "It would seem that one of the Copy Ninja's students has a connection to Minato Namikaze, could possibly be his son. He also has the same marks on his face that Ginkaku and Kikaku had, so it appears that he is connected to the Kyubi also."

"We found out that the last jinchuriki of the Kyubi was named Kushina Uzumaki," Darui said, remembering the information that he had heard at the end of the Third Great Shinobi War.

"It could be that this boy is the son of Minato Namikaze but was given the last name of the second Jinchuriki of the Nine-Tails, " A mused as he set the picture down and removed a blank scroll from one of the drawers of his desk.

"What are you doing, Boss?" Darui asked curiously.

"Back before the Hyuga Affair started, we signed a treaty with Konohagakure. One of the conditions that was made was that we could participate in the International Chunin Exams that they set up at the end of the Third Great Shinobi War. All we had to do was ask," A explained as he began to write on the scroll. "So I'm asking now."

That threw Darui for a loop.

"Are we going to capture him or something?" Darui asked.

"No," A said as he shook his head. "That would be a pain in the ass. The last thing we need is for them and their allies to declare war on us. It would weaken us more than it would gain us. We're just going to do a little recon. If we find that the possible son of the Kiiroi Senkō (_Yellow Flash_) has the potential to cause us trouble, we'll just have him killed by one of the genin we send. If he's killed during the exams, they can't do anything."

No one could say that A was just a brute of a man. He was also very intelligent.

Of course, no one could have predicted how the coming Chunin Exams would change the dynamic of the Elemental Nations.

**XChapter EndX**

**My third story and I'll be using chapters from Crimson Tempest as a template for a few chapters while adding my own additions and touches to this story and don't worry the chapter lengths will get longer  
**


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto, Darkness or any crossover elements that may be added into this story.**

**Italics for thoughts**

**Bold for Jutsu, Sealed and Non Human characters**

**XChapter StartX**

It had been a couple of weeks since Naruto and his team had been back from their mission to Nami no Kuni where after resting for a couple of days, that was granted by the Hokage, resumed their team training and taking missions again but with a major difference for Naruto.

Instead of actually attending himself Naruto had just sent a **Kage Bushin** (_Shadow Clone_) to his team meetings and mission assignment as Naruto had a feeling that his team wouldn't be getting anymore C-ranked missions for a while.

And it was with the first time Naruto did this that he discovered something truly remarkable, he discovered that when a Kage Bushin dispelled itself everything that they learn is transferred back to him, though he didn't know that at first and decided to see if it would happen again by having a Kage Bushin read a single page from a book then dispelled itself and to Naruto's great joy the Kage Bushin transferred the knowledge back to him again but this time Naruto wondered if he could use this for his training which he started immediately by trying to do something he saw Kakashi do 'walking on water'.

Though Naruto didn't know how that work at all he knew that it involved concentrating chakra in feet, during the couple of weeks that Naruto and his team had been able to resume taking missions, Naruto had figured out, and was now able to stand on top of the water and was able to fight with some other clones that he created for a couple of hours before he started to sink into the water forcing him to get to land.

It was now the first day of June, meaning that Kakashi and his team had been back in the village for the last month.

During that time, the team had met for team training every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday morning at ten in the morning and Naruto continued to send a Kage Bushin to their meetings, seeing as kakashi only had them doing teamwork exercises, while they did a mission once every other Friday after training. Naruto knew that Kakashi has been training Sasuke every Tuesday and Thursday over the past month. He also knew that Kakashi had spoken with Sakura the previous day about him training her every Tuesday and Thursday of June, so it appeared that he would be training Naruto in July.

Personally, Naruto did not care one way or the other, which was a stark contrast to his previous position on not being trained by Kakashi.

He had never shown up on time to Kakashi's team training sessions. He showed up five minutes until ten every day, which was when Kakashi arrived. It made Sakura mad at him, but he mostly ignored her now. He had grown out of his crush for her after he started to take his training seriously. He did not dislike her, but she just was not someone that he was interested in that way anymore.

In a meeting room in the Administration Building, Hiruzen Sarutobi was sitting before a group of individuals. Among those individuals were Homura Mitkado, Koharu Utatane, Shikaku Nara, Inoichi Yamanaka, Choza Akimichi, Tsume Inuzuka, Shibi Aburame, Hiashi Hyuga, and Kurenai Yuhi.

All of the individuals present looked somewhat uneasy. While it was common enough for the Advisory Council, which consisted of Homura and Koharu, to be summoned before the Hokage, it was somewhat rare for the Advisory Council, the heads of the Three Noble Clans, the Jonin Commander, two additional heads of prominent clans, and a fairly new jonin to all be summoned before the Hokage at once.

"I'm sure you're all wondering why you're here before me today," Hiruzen said as he exhaled some smoke through his pipe. "The answer is simple enough. Fourteen days ago, we received a message through courier from Kumogakure." Hiashi Hyuga visibly tensed at that. "Back when we signed a treaty with them, the Raikage insisted on one particular term that no one thought much of. I forgot about it, in fact. That term was that Kumogakure could participate in any Chunin Exam we hosted at their request, despite not being an actual ally. The Raikage has requested to take part in the Chunin Exams that we will be hosting in July."

The room grew silent at that for a short time. It was hard to believe that something like that was happening, especially for certain people like Hiashi, who had good reason to not want to have to see any Cloud ninja ever again.

"I intended on denying the request, but to do so would be a violation of our treaty. However, I have succeeded in convincing the Raikage to only send one team of genin to the Chunin Exams," Hiruzen said before an outburst could be made. "As many of you know, Kumokagure has come to our village with ulterior motives before. It would not be a great surprise if this was a similar situation. It should not need saying, but you should all be on guard when they arrive during the last week of this month. It is for this reason that I've asked you all here. This could potentially affect any of the major clans of the village, especially the Hyuga clan."

"So that's why I'm here," Kurenai said as she realized what the connection was between her and the current situation: Hinata Hyuga.

"Yes," Hiruzen said as he nodded in confirmation.

"After what they pulled, they have the gall to make demands based on that treaty?" Tsume asked with a growl. "They should be put in their place."

"We have no way of knowing if that was even an authorized mission," Shibi suddenly said. "All that can be made on that matter is speculation. It should just be left in the past. Allowing past grievances to cloud your eyes will only blind you to the present and future."

"I agree," Hiashi said, though he sounded extremely tired. "Focusing on today and tomorrow will be more productive than focusing on yesterday."

"Do we know who the jonin that is coming to the village with the teams is?" Shikaku asked, changing the direction of the conversation.

"The jonin's name is Darui," Hiruzen said as he looked at his Jonin Commander.

"I've heard of Darui before," Shikaku said with a frown. "He was the student of the Sandaime Raikage, wasn't he?"

"Yes, he's the only known user of the Sandaime Raikage's Kuroi Kaminari (Black Lightning) too," Hiruzen said as he nodded his head. "I don't have anything on the genin that are coming at the present, but you will all be kept posted. For now, you are dismissed."

A chorus of "Understood, Hokage-Sama," rang through the room as everyone other than Kurenai Yuhi rose to their feet.

Once everyone but Hiruzen and Kurenai had left, the Hokage said, "I expected you would remain."

"I'm worried about my student, even if _he_ isn't," Kurenai said with a frown. It was obvious who the _he_ was that she was referring to.

"It's understandable that you would worry for your student," Hiruzen said with a small smile. "I remember what it was like to be a sensei, though I was still the Hokage at that time."

"The Sannin," Kurenai said quietly, clearly thinking back to what she knew of the Sandaime Hokage's only students.

"That is what they became," Hiruzen said with a reflective smile. "But they were just a few brats back when I got them." His tone grew somber at that. "It's a shame that none of them are in the village any longer."

"If Jiraiya-Sama or Tsunade-Sama were here, then Kumokagure would not dare try anything," Kurenai said, taking a different train of thought than the Hokage had.

"You could say that, but it's for no such reason that I wish that my students were here," Hiruzen said with a grim smile. He had always loved all three of his students, even when Tsunade forsook the Senju name and Orochimaru did what he did.

"I apologize for my thoughtlessness," Kurenai said sincerely.

"It's fine. You're just worried for Hinata Hyuga," Hiruzen said with a shake of his head. "I placed her on your team for a reason. While she would have been better protected under Kakashi or my son, she needs a strong female role model. With you, I'm sure she's growing far more than she would under either one of them. Even so, you should work your team harder than you have been now that the Hidden Cloud Village is taking part in the Chunin Exams, especially if you intend to let them compete."

Kurenai looked as though she had just been blindsided.

"Yes, I know about your intentions to enter them in the Chunin Exams, despite their inexperience and the trouble they've had with certain missions. You should take care to keep your conversations with Anko private, unless you wish for them to become common knowledge," Hiruzen said with a hint of amusement. "Don't worry though. I am not against your idea. Even if they don't pass the test, it would be useful for them to get the experience. Few genin pass on their first attempt."

"Thank you, Hokage-Sama," Kurenai rose to her feet. "I must go and meet with my team if that's alright with you."

Hiruzen simply nodded as he puffed on his pipe.

* * *

In Kumogakure, A was sitting at his desk, looking at the three genin that were standing in front of the door.

He had intended on sending three teams of genin to compete in the Chunin Exams, but he had allowed the Hokage to have his way this time. It was understandable that the village was still sore about the Hyuga Affair. Perhaps he could have handled it better at the time. His father had been the one to actually plan the theft of the Byakugan. As it turned out, he died before it carried out but after he gave the order to go through with the mission. As a result, A had only been the Yondaime Raikage for a month when he had to deal with the incident, and his inexperience in the position had made things rather difficult, especially since he had not known about the secret mission until after he demanded the body of Hiashi Hyuga for the murder of one of his shinobi.

That was the only reason that he was willing to agree to Hiruzen Sarutobi's request. It was also the only reason that he did not do anything when the Hidden Leaf Village tried to deceive them with the body of Hizashi Hyuga.

Taking a deep breath, he spoke to the genin in the room.

"Samui, Omoi, and Karui, I have asked you here today to give you a special mission. If you succeed with this mission, you will be promoted to the rank of chunin," A said, earning their full, undivided attention. "The mission is simple. You are to compete in the Chunin Selection Exams in Konohagakure. While there, you are to get a basic understanding of the village's layout in case it is needed at a later point, you are to determine which competitors we should be mindful of in the future, you are to test the capabilities of the last loyal member of the Uchiha clan, and you are to observe the genin known as Naruto Uzumaki. I wish to know everything that is relevant about him as if you were viewing him as an enemy or an ally. If you determine that he is a threat to our village, you are to see to it that he dies during the Chunin Exams. That does not include a situation where a war breaks out. He is the Kyubi-jinchuriki, so if a war were to break out between us, it would be expected for him to be a threat in such a situation. Do you accept this mission?"

"Yes sir," Samui said, lowering her head.

"Yes sir," Karui and Omoi said in unison.

"Regardless of how you do in the Chunin Exams, I will grant you a field promotion if you succeed in this mission. Keep in mind that the main objective is Naruto Uzumaki," A said, pleased that they accepted the mission.

"Sir, what exactly are we looking for when determining if he is a threat to our village?" Samui asked.

"I am not concerned about his power or skill when I say that he is to be dealt with if he becomes a threat," A explained. "Personality and attitude are important here. If he's insane or unstable, kill him. If he wants to conquer the world of destroy any village, kill him. If you believe that he would actually harm our village without being ordered to by the Hokage or without us doing something to provoke him, act accordingly. After all, while we may be trying to ensure that he does not become an enemy of ours, it would be much better to gain him as an ally through a stronger alliance than to kill him."

"Understood," Samui said, looking up. "Who will our captain be?"

"Darui will go with you and act as your jonin-sensei," A answered. "You will not be going on any missions outside of the village until it's time to go to Konohagakure. Be careful not to get injured before then. Finding a replacement for one of you would be nearly impossible. You are the only genin in the village with experience with jinchuriki, and you are also the strongest genin in the village. You are now dismissed."

With that, Omoi and Karui got up and started walking towards the door when they noticed that Samui hadn't moved and looked back to see that she hadn't moved, confusing them.

"Is there something else that you need?" A said as he saw that Samui hadn't moved.

"Pardon me Raikage-Sama, but would you happen to have a picture of Naruto Uzumaki, as I believe it would be a correct decision to known what our target look like".

At hearing this A just nodded agreeing with what Samui had said, and quickly took out a photo of Naruto and handed it to Samui "that is a photo that Darui had taken when he spotted Naruto Uzumaki on his last mission, you are to keep that with you until you leave for Konohagakure and memorize what he looks like." A said to the three genin who nodded and walked out of the room leaving A to his paperwork.

**X-End-X**

**Review please**


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